So anyway, I was helping my friend try to compile a program. Well... we go into the directory where we compile it.

I type make. NOTHING HAPPENS. It says "gcc: command not found"

Of all the programs NOT to be found in a Linux system, IT CAN'T FIND GCC. AND THE SYSTEM IS STILL UP.

This was all done in Mandrake 9 (avoid it, it's pure evil).

So, having to comply with Mandrake's (well, Red Hat's) stupid RPM system, I tried installing GCC via RPM. Dependencies not found. I decide to start with glibc-devel. glibc-devel won't install because the kernel-headers aren't there. I install kernel headers. I try installing glibc-devel AGAIN. The package manager refuses to work - "file not found" even though the file is THERE! Aaargh...

Bottom line: I'm glad I don't have to put up with this with Gentoo, since Gentoo takes no offense and has no problem calculating dependencies and compiling. I'm very happy with it.

I think Gentoo has become my #1 recommendation... I still recommend Mandrake to utter newbies, but if anyone is remotely good with computers I will recommend Gentoo every time.

RPM-hell is what sent me here too. In MDK I tried to install KDE3 with the rpm THEY provided, and ran into dep problems, which had there own dep problems, which had there own dep problems ... . I also was never able to get a kernal to compile with it.

I came from Mandrake 9, and while I was using it I never(not once) got their graphical RPM package manager to work. I could install rpm's at the command line, easily enough(if fishing all of the depencies, downloading them, and installing them manually, and in reverse order counts as *easy*). I also did some source compiles(gcc was fine on the system, at least), but still, I was manually downloading source tarballs, reading the README files to find out what dependencies I needed, etc.

I discovered Gentoo in late February, and when I read about Larry the Cow, and the Portage system, I was sold. I only hesistated a week or two because maybe I thought it was too good to be true(actually, I think I waited to install on spring break, since I had to have my linux box working for classes)._________________The Congress shall have power...To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries; --U.S. Constitution. Article 1, Section 8.

I too came from Mandrake (first 9.0, then 9.1), and I've got to agree, moving to Gentoo was a real revelation. What a mess it was to chase the web over for rpms and their dependencies! Portage is pure bliss in comparison !! These days it's all I can do to stay away from the development kernels and moving to ~x86, so as not to spend every free moment tweaking my Gentoo box .

I use RedHat only on my laptop to comply with the servers I run, but for my personal computers how could i deal with it? Gentoo is 10 times better. My sole reason for disliking linux is the problem with installing programs and emerge has solved that problem for me Gentoo has made me a full time Linux user._________________That statement below is true
The statement above is false

Mandrake being a binary-package orientated distro doesnt really need a compiler to give it a basic level of functionality. Chances are good that you can install quite a lot by typing in 'urpmi $packagename', which will scour the packages sources you have defined ( such as the install CDs, security updates, the 'cooker' bleeding edge dev packages and so on ) and grab the needed packages and dependant bits from wherever they happen to be.

Gentoo OTOH is the diametic opposite, getting by without a compiler is unthinkable, and the 'compile your own system' ethos is one of the core features of the distro. The quality of portage makes this a breeze, so you get the edge over a mandraker' by virtue of having a more highly optimised package at the expense of the compile time - not really a problem on the GHz cpus of the present, even for beasts like a full gnome/kde build.

They both have their advantages, and an experienced user of either is likely to find both responsive and powerful..

Gentoo has the edge though in packages, its a whole lot easier to maintain ebuilds than it to maintain a whole set of binary RPMS built for a generic hardware set - this is a winning move that no number of dedicated maintainers can really compete with.

In all fairness to Mandrake, installing gcc is pretty easy, you just type "urpmi gcc" and it'll ask for the CD's, or if you don't have them anymore, you can change your sources at plf.zarb.org and it'll download gcc from some mandrake ftp.

Mandrake _was_ the best Distro for me around their 8.0/8.1/8.2 release and i really thought this was the way to go for Linux. Then they unfortunately got into cash troubles, had to fire a few people and since then it (9.0/9.1) really sucks.
The drake tools are extremely buggy - it was impossible for me to install grub as a bootloader instead of Lilo because that stupid wizzard just ignored me.
If i hadn't discovered Gentoo i would be stuck with SuSE or some other RPM hell..

The last Mandrake I could stand was waaaaaaaaaaay back in the 5 series. After that the wizzy-wig-wizard goodness was driving my bonkers.

I mean at 3am when I'm trying to troubleshoot a router problem is NOT the time to get into a fight with "DrakeNet." Bloody thing would keep changing my network settings cause I modified the .cfg file instead of using the wizard. Grrrrrr

Redhat and ManDrake kinda have the same mindset any more... "How many wizards can we put infront of the user and the OS?" When RH changed the names of the X utilites the game was over for me._________________Kres

I had mandrake9.1 installed as a playtoy on my desktop machine. I found its only issues to be in that it is designed to be used without necessitating that you have a clue. Members of the mandrake club get access to binaries of almost every app you can imagine. Now, while this isn't preferable for us, it's a really great thing for a lot of people.. especially those unfamiliar to non-mswin machines.

As for gcc not being found, Mandrake doesn't give users compile access by default. You have to add them to the correct group.

True, mandrake is going to be hell if you're used to editting text files, but for a total newb, it allows just about anyone to sit down at a machine and actually USE it. The recent overhaul of mandrake config tools was really top notch, too.. as are the general install and the system updating features.
(All this said with the assumption that if you're going to use mandrake, you play by the mandrake rules, and just CLICK on options instead of uncommenting them. ;) )

Mandrake won me over during the install, actually. I misplaced the third disc (or maybe forgot to burn it?!).. when it got to software on the third disc during install, it prompted me for the disc.. responded that I didn't have it, and mandrake was okay with that. It told me that everything was going to be okay.. and it booted, and i started the mandrake software manager, after burning the cd.. and continued installing the missing packages.

Mandrake's completely silly if you're a power user, but for your boss.. for your cousin.. it's not bad.

well, other than that whole _disgustingly slow_ thing.. :)_________________not sold in stores
sorry, no c.o.d's

I don't think it's fair to flame RH/MDK for (too many) wizzards and holding the user's hand. After all, RH/MDK is aimed for quick simple setup for unexperienced users, and for a windows user coming to linux, the wizzards are a great relief.

And well, if you've outgrown the wizzards and the dependency hell, just come to papa gentoo.

The dependency hell drove me from RH to Debian, and that only solved the half of my frustrations, the other half was I wanted the power to customize my setup, which gentoo offered ontop a package system.

I found that with most of the RH-based distros, if you want anything to work correctly, you pretty much have to go with the "Install Everything" option. And although this ensures that most everything will work (for the most part), the obvious drawback is that you end-up with almost 3GB of junk taking up your valuable hard drive real estate....a syndrome all too reminiscent of Winders XP and company.

Which is precisely where the beauty in Gentoo comes in. My first install with Flux, Evolution, Mozilla, Gaim (the usual stuff), I was astounded that the installation barely broke 800MB.

I was a Mandrake user since 6.X. The most buggy I found was MDK 9.0. Had a lot of problems with automount (anyway I don't use it right now). And that make me change to RH 8 (and 9) for my work servers (which previously use MDK 8.1). Both distros have good GUI tools to configure the system and services. But found RH more stable, while MDK more compatible with outside world apps (ie. webmin/openssl/netssleay).

Tried gentoo as a test for my personal workstation, and like it more than any other distro out there. Dificult to install it is, but a gift from heaven to maintain up to date.

I had used Mandrake from 7.0 through 9.1, pretty much a Linux newbie the whole time. I didn't really get much into any of the non-newb stuff in Linux until 9.1 came out. I figured out how limited MDK was and wanted to try different distros, the first one I came to was Gentoo I don't need any other distros now. Got this one installed on three machines, two PCs and my iBook. It's a damn fun distro, too. Portage is great -- I've used Fink on OS X so it felt like I was pretty much at home.

If you want to know your system, Mandrake is so not the distro to go for. If you want to just test linux, maybe... but for somebody who wants to find out about linux (newbs included) you're better off mucking it out with Gentoo (or Slack, or Debian) to end up with a system that you have mastered and is easy to keep tamed.

Mandrake was just a mess for me. Everything I tried didn't work. It's as if they only designed it to work as a 'default install' and only cordially provided completely untested packages for upgrading anything that didn't come with the CDs._________________Want Free games?
Free Gamer - open source games list & commentary

Well I hear a lot of complaints here about RPM based distros, that rather sounds like newbie crap, Mandrake gcc works just fine, also rpm dependency errors are easyily solved, if you know what your are doing.

I have been using Mandrake for years, as well as RedHat and FreeBSD, I work as a unix developer.

I'd say the advantage of gentoo is, that you can customize the packages via USE flags, which is not possible like that with precompiled rpms or even if you recompile the src.rpms. Also there is no overhead installed.

But the side effects are, that gentoo is not very well preconfigured, this results in very lax security, I'd say at least 50% of the gentoo users don't have the knowledge to setup their system with a minimal level of security, This is the advantage of mainstream distros, they are already pretty much configured for security, even if you add an account later oin, they run security checks etc, for example mandrakes msec.

You may come ip with the Documentation for Security, but I can tell you that Documentation just covers just a few aspects, no guide how to secure you webserver etc.

Well I hear a lot of complaints here about RPM based distros, that rather sounds like newbie crap, Mandrake gcc works just fine, also rpm dependency errors are easyily solved, if you know what your are doing.

I have been using Mandrake for years, as well as RedHat and FreeBSD, I work as a unix developer.

You've unwittingly demonstrated the entire problem with Mandrake, Red Hat, etc. Despite being self proclaimed 'easy to use' distributions, it seems that only those with experience can effectively configure, customise, maintain and update them.

Yet here comes Gentoo, which doesn't hide linux and doesn't claim to be idiot proof and let's you know that you have to get a little dirty. But the excellent documentation assumes you are inexperienced and steps you through it and you find out how it works and what makes it tick.

Granted, I'd probably have more success with Mandrake if I were to go back to it now. But why would I? Gentoo offers much more to me with it's cutting edge attitude, it's friendly community, it's easier-than-pie portage and yadda yadda.

i hate mandrake too
but rpm is really nice when its used with a good front end like urpmi or apt_________________ex: Gentoo Linux Developer: amd64 media-optical sound gnome
ex: Portuguese Moderator
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
God Doesn't Play Dice

Just to add up to the pile of anti-MDK, I must say I also come from Mandrake. I started with 8.1 and stopped at 9.0. I used it for a while. I wasn't all happy but I thought the distro didn't really matter. I had apache, MySQL and postfix running, blackbox, KMail and Galeon for time wasting. Then I tried to install 9.1 but I felt the installer was hiding to much things from me. The default install seems to install what it wants, you can't even choose the packages you want, like before. Well, of course you can, but it's not clear enough IMO.

So, fdisk everything. I installed OpenBSD instead. Used it for a few months. My friend had been using Gentoo for about a year and I finally decided to give it a try. Right now, it runs perfectly and it's the best distro I've ever used. Friendlier than *BSD but it doesn't assume you're a 13 years-old illiterate white-trash crackhead.

Then I tried to install 9.1 but I felt the installer was hiding to much things from me. The default install seems to install what it wants, you can't even choose the packages you want, like before. Well, of course you can, but it's not clear enough IMO.